Citizenship in the United States - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Citizenship in the United States is a status given to individuals that entails specific rights

Rights

Rights are legal, social, or ethical principles of freedom or entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people, according to some legal system, social convention, or ethical theory...

, duties, privileges, and benefits between the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

and the individual. Citizenship

Citizenship

Citizenship is the state of being a citizen of a particular social, political, national, or human resource community. Citizenship status, under social contract theory, carries with it both rights and responsibilities...

is a legal marker identifying a person as having a bundle of rights, including the right to live and work in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

and to receive federal assistance and government services.

In accordance with the Citizenship Clause

Citizenship Clause

The Citizenship Clause refers to the first sentence of Section 1 in the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. This clause represented Congress's reversal of that portion of the Dred Scott v...

, part of the Fourteenth Amendment

Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was adopted on July 9, 1868, as one of the Reconstruction Amendments.Its Citizenship Clause provides a broad definition of citizenship that overruled the Dred Scott v...

to the United States Constitution

United States Constitution

The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It is the framework for the organization of the United States government and for the relationship of the federal government with the states, citizens, and all people within the United States.The first three...

, citizenship may be acquired automatically at birth or through the process of naturalization

Naturalization

Naturalization is the acquisition of citizenship and nationality by somebody who was not a citizen of that country at the time of birth....

: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction

Jurisdiction

Jurisdiction is the practical authority granted to a formally constituted legal body or to a political leader to deal with and make pronouncements on legal matters and, by implication, to administer justice within a defined area of responsibility...

thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State

U.S. state

A U.S. state is any one of the 50 federated states of the United States of America that share sovereignty with the federal government. Because of this shared sovereignty, an American is a citizen both of the federal entity and of his or her state of domicile. Four states use the official title of...

wherein they reside." The Constitution, in Article One

Article One of the United States Constitution

Article One of the United States Constitution describes the powers of Congress, the legislative branch of the federal government. The Article establishes the powers of and limitations on the Congress, consisting of a House of Representatives composed of Representatives, with each state gaining or...

, gives to Congress

United States Congress

The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....

the power "To establish a uniform rule of naturalization." Most persons who undergo naturalization do so to get permission to live and work

Employment

Employment is a contract between two parties, one being the employer and the other being the employee. An employee may be defined as:- Employee :...

in the nation legally.

American law permits multiple citizenship

Multiple citizenship

Multiple citizenship is a status in which a person is concurrently regarded as a citizen under the laws of more than one state. Multiple citizenships exist because different countries use different, and not necessarily mutually exclusive, citizenship requirements...

, so a citizen of another country may retain their native citizenship after becoming a citizen of the United States. The reverse is not necessarily true, however; one cannot always maintain U.S. citizenship after attaining citizenship of another country. Citizenship can be renounced by citizens, and it can also be restored.

Relation of citizenship

The concept of citizenship has varied in different cultures and times. The Athenian citizen-soldier model required civic participation as well as a duty to fight as part of a well-coordinated phalanx. Roman citizenship was a prized distinction in the early years of the Republic which also entailed a military commitment. In the United States today, however, citizenship entails few commitments to other citizens or to government; there is no military requirement or call for civic participation. Rather, citizenship is the legal status of membership in the United States. Citizens have the right to live and work without fear of deportation. The activities typically associated with citizenship typically include duties and privileges.
In the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

today, everyone except those whose income is derived from tax exempt revenue (Subchapter N, Section 861 of the US Tax Code) is required to pay taxes, and this has been the case for many years. The U.S. requires that aliens

Alien (law)

In law, an alien is a person in a country who is not a citizen of that country.-Categorization:Types of "alien" persons are:*An alien who is legally permitted to remain in a country which is foreign to him or her. On specified terms, this kind of alien may be called a legal alien of that country...

who are present in the United States, including non-immigrants and illegal immigrants

Illegal immigration to the United States

An illegal immigrant in the United States is an alien who has entered the United States without government permission or stayed beyond the termination date of a visa....

, for more than 180 days must file tax return

Tax return (United States)

Tax returns in the United States are reports filed with the Internal Revenue Service or with the state or local tax collection agency containing information used to calculate income tax or other taxes...

s. American citizens are subject to taxes wherever they go in the world. Since the United States requires citizens living abroad to file taxes, some Americans renounce their citizenship as a way to cope with the administrative burden of filing complex tax forms. In 2003, there were 509 Americans who renounced citizenship. In 2007, 470 Americans renounced their citizenship to move abroad. One estimate was that the numbers of Americans turning in their passports each year for political and economic reasons was small, with the numbers reaching a high of about 2,000 during a Vietnam War-era boom in the 1970s. One lawyer commented that the "administrative costs of being an American and living outside the U.S. have gone up dramatically." One account suggested that increased "taxation is driving many Americans to turn in their passports." But Congress passed rules to tax assets on so-called tax exile
Tax exile
A tax exile is one who chooses to leave a country with a high tax burden and instead to reside in a foreign nation or jurisdiction which takes a lower portion of earnings. Going into tax exile is a means of tax mitigation or avoidance.-Legal status:...

s or renunciators of American citizenship, who abandon US citizenship for tax purposes, as well as tax any heirs or beneficiaries of those people who still live in the territorial United States. According to a tax accountant, "The new rules say, if you leave any of your property to a U.S. person, it will be taxed at the rates for U.S. gift tax", which were 45% in 2008.

Duties

Jury duty is only imposed upon citizens. Jury duty
Jury duty
Jury duty is service as a juror in a legal proceeding. When a person is called for jury duty in the United States, that service is usually not optional: one must attend or face strict penalties. Employers are not allowed to fire an employee simply for being called to jury duty...

may be considered the "sole differential obligation" between non-citizens and citizens; the federal and state courts "uniformly exclude non-citizens from jury pools today, and with the exception of a few states in the past, this has always been the case. Today there are indications jury duty is declining; there are fewer trials. Newspaper reports have chronicled the decline of juries, and noted how many people don't get summonses, and how Americans see jury duty as an "inconvenient" chore.

Military participation is not currently required in the United States, but a policy of conscription
Conscription in the United States
Conscription in the United States has been employed several times, usually during war but also during the nominal peace of the Cold War...

of men has been in place at various times (both in war and in peace) in American history, most recently during the Vietnam War
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...

. Currently, the United States armed forces
United States armed forces
The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. They consist of the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and Coast Guard.The United States has a strong tradition of civilian control of the military...

are a professional all-volunteer
Volunteer military
A volunteer military or all-volunteer military is one which derives its manpower from volunteers rather than conscription or mandatory service. A country may offer attractive pay and benefits through military recruitment to attract volunteers...

force, although both male U.S. citizens and male non-citizen permanent residents are required to register with the Selective Service System
Selective Service System
The Selective Service System is a means by which the United States government maintains information on those potentially subject to military conscription. Most male U.S. citizens and male immigrant non-citizens between the ages of 18 and 25 are required by law to have registered within 30 days of...

and may be called up in the event of a future draft. Johns Hopkins University
Johns Hopkins University
The Johns Hopkins University, commonly referred to as Johns Hopkins, JHU, or simply Hopkins, is a private research university based in Baltimore, Maryland, United States...

political scientist Benjamin Ginsberg
Benjamin Ginsberg (political scientist)
Benjamin Ginsberg is a libertarian political scientist and professor at Johns Hopkins University who is notable for his criticism of American politics in which citizens have become "marginalized as political actors" and political parties weakened while state power has grown...

wrote "the professional military has limited the need for citizen soldiers."

Rights

Freedom to reside and work. United States citizens have the right to reside and work in the United States. Certain non-citizens, such as permanent residents, have similar rights. However, non-citizens, unlike citizens, may have the right taken away: for example, they may be deported
Deportation
Deportation means the expulsion of a person or group of people from a place or country. Today it often refers to the expulsion of foreign nationals whereas the expulsion of nationals is called banishment, exile, or penal transportation...

if convicted of a serious crime. There are many jobs, opportunities, and educational opportunities. Some immigrants see citizenship as a way of "locking in economic gains that they have made as legal residents." One person said "People don’t feel that being permanent residents is enough to secure their future in this country. They would just feel more secure as citizens."

Freedom to enter and leave the United States. United States citizens have the right to enter and leave the United States freely. Certain non-citizens, such as permanent residents, have similar rights.

Voting for federal office is restricted to citizens in all fifty states and the District of Columbia. States are not required to extend the franchise to all citizens: for example, several states bar citizen felon
Felony
A felony is a serious crime in the common law countries. The term originates from English common law where felonies were originally crimes which involved the confiscation of a convicted person's land and goods; other crimes were called misdemeanors...

s from voting, even after they have completed any custodial sentence. The United States Constitution bars states from restricting citizens from voting on grounds of race, color, previous condition of servitude, sex, failure to pay any tax, or age (for citizens who are at least eighteen years old). Historically, many states and local jurisdictions have allowed non-citizens to vote
Right of foreigners to vote in the United States
The right of foreigners to vote in the United States has historically been a contentious issue. A foreigner, in this context, is a person who is not citizen of the United States....

; however, today this is limited to local elections in very few places. Voting is not required, unlike nations such as Australia and Belgium where citizens can be fined for failing to vote
Compulsory voting
Compulsory voting is a system in which electors are obliged to vote in elections or attend a polling place on voting day. If an eligible voter does not attend a polling place, he or she may be subject to punitive measures such as fines, community service, or perhaps imprisonment if fines are unpaid...

. Historically, voting rates in presidential elections by eligible citizens hover around the 50% level, although the recent election of Barack Obama
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...

in 2008 saw levels rise over 60%. Legal immigrants are sometimes motivated to become citizens for a chance to exercise voting power.

Freedom to stand for public office. The United States Constitution requires that all members of the United States House of Representatives
United States House of Representatives
The United States House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the United States Congress, the bicameral legislature which also includes the Senate.The composition and powers of the House are established in Article One of the Constitution...

have been citizens for seven years, and that all senator
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...

s have been citizens for nine years, before taking office. Most states have similar requirements: for example California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

requires that legislators have been citizens for three years, and the Governor have been a citizen for five years, upon taking office. The U.S. Constitution requires that one be "a natural born Citizen" and a U.S. resident for fourteen years in order to be President of the United States.

The Constitution also stipulates that otherwise eligible citizens must be at least 35 years old to be eligible to be president, at least 25 years old to be a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, and at least 30 years old to be a U.S. Senator.

Substantial benefits

Consular protection outside the United States. While traveling abroad, if a person is arrested or detained by foreign authorities, the person can request to speak to somebody from the U.S. Embassy or Consulate. Consular officials can provide resources for Americans incarcerated abroad, such as a list of local attorneys who speak English. The U.S. government
Federal government of the United States
The federal government of the United States is the national government of the constitutional republic of fifty states that is the United States of America. The federal government comprises three distinct branches of government: a legislative, an executive and a judiciary. These branches and...

may even intervene on the person's behalf. For example, an American citizen named William E. Petty, who was jailed by authorities in France in 1854, petitioned U.S. authorities to intervene on his behalf. In a twist of this principle, it's possible for foreign governments to confer citizenship on persons serving in jails in the United States. But it illustrates how citizenship is a way to try to extend the hand of protection to nationals when incarcerated in foreign jails.

Access to social services. Many social services in the United States are only eligible to American citizens.

Increased ability to sponsor relatives living abroad. Several types of immigrant visas require that the person requesting the visa be directly related to a U.S. citizen. Having U.S. citizenship facilitates the granting of IR and F visas to family members.

Protection from deportation. Naturalized U.S. citizens are no longer considered aliens
Alien (law)
In law, an alien is a person in a country who is not a citizen of that country.-Categorization:Types of "alien" persons are:*An alien who is legally permitted to remain in a country which is foreign to him or her. On specified terms, this kind of alien may be called a legal alien of that country...

and cannot be placed into deportation proceedings
Deportation
Deportation means the expulsion of a person or group of people from a place or country. Today it often refers to the expulsion of foreign nationals whereas the expulsion of nationals is called banishment, exile, or penal transportation...

.

Other benefits. The USCIS sometimes honors the achievements of naturalized U.S. citizens. The 'Outstanding American by Choice Award' was created by the USCIS to recognize the outstanding achievements of naturalized U.S. citizens, and past recipients include author Elie Wiesel
Elie Wiesel
Sir Eliezer "Elie" Wiesel KBE; born September 30, 1928) is a Hungarian-born Jewish-American writer, professor, political activist, Nobel Laureate, and Holocaust survivor. He is the author of 57 books, including Night, a work based on his experiences as a prisoner in the Auschwitz, Buna, and...

who won the Nobel Peace Prize
Nobel Peace Prize
The Nobel Peace Prize is one of the five Nobel Prizes bequeathed by the Swedish industrialist and inventor Alfred Nobel.-Background:According to Nobel's will, the Peace Prize shall be awarded to the person who...

; Indra K. Nooyi who is CEO of PepsiCo
PepsiCo
PepsiCo Inc. is an American multinational corporation headquartered in Purchase, New York, United States, with interests in the manufacturing, marketing and distribution of grain-based snack foods, beverages, and other products. PepsiCo was formed in 1965 with the merger of the Pepsi-Cola Company...

; John Shalikashvili who was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Joint Chiefs of Staff
The Joint Chiefs of Staff is a body of senior uniformed leaders in the United States Department of Defense who advise the Secretary of Defense, the Homeland Security Council, the National Security Council and the President on military matters...

; and others. Further, citizenship status can affect which country an athlete can compete as a member of in competitions such as the Olympics.

Civic participation

Participation (decision making)

Participation in social science refers to different mechanisms for the public to express opinions - and ideally exert influence - regarding political, economic, management or other social decisions. Participatory decision making can take place along any realm of human social activity, including...

is not required in the United States. There is no requirement to attend town meetings, read newspapers, stay informed about issues, belong to a political party, or write letters; citizens can stay home and do nothing if they choose. One source suggested that a benefit of naturalization is letting immigrants "participate fully in the civic life of the country." There is disagreement about whether popular lack of involvement in politics is helpful or harmful. Vanderbilt

Vanderbilt University

Vanderbilt University is a private research university located in Nashville, Tennessee, United States. Founded in 1873, the university is named for shipping and rail magnate "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt, who provided Vanderbilt its initial $1 million endowment despite having never been to the...

professor Dana D. Nelson

Dana D. Nelson

Dana D. Nelson is a professor of English at Vanderbilt University and a prominent progressive advocate for citizenship and democracy. She is notable for her criticism in her books such as Bad for Democracy of excessive presidential power and for exposing a tendency by Americans to neglect basic...

suggests that most Americans merely vote for president every four years, and that's all they do, and she sees this pattern as undemocratic. In her book Bad for Democracy
Bad for Democracy
Bad for Democracy: How the Presidency Undermines the Power of the People is a non-fiction book written by Vanderbilt professor Dana D. Nelson. It is notable for criticism of excessive presidential power and for her call for substantive political reform...

, Nelson argues that declining citizen participation in politics is unhealthy for long term prospects for democracy

Democracy

Democracy is generally defined as a form of government in which all adult citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives. Ideally, this includes equal participation in the proposal, development and passage of legislation into law...

. Generally, civic participation is almost nonexistent for wide swaths of the American public. One 2009 study found that seven in ten citizens showed "declining civic involvement" nationally, and that citizens of Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

were "disappointed, frustrated and disillusioned by recent political scandals and the pressures of the recession." However, writers such as Robert D. Kaplan

Robert D. Kaplan

Robert David Kaplan is an American journalist, currently a National Correspondent for the Atlantic Monthly...

in The Atlantic see benefits to non-involvement; he wrote "the very indifference of most people allows for a calm and healthy political climate." Kaplan elaborated: "Apathy, after all, often means that the political situation is healthy enough to be ignored. The last thing America needs is more voters–particularly badly educated and alienated ones–with a passion for politics." He argued that civic participation

Civic engagement

Civic engagement or civic participation has been defined as "Individual and collective actions designed to identify and address issues of public concern."-Forms:...

, in itself, is not always a sufficient condition to bring good outcomes, and pointed to authoritarian societies such as Singapore

Singapore

Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...

which prospered because it had "relative safety from corruption, from breach of contract, from property expropriation, and from bureaucratic inefficiency."

Dual citizenship

A person who is considered a citizen by more than one nation has dual citizenship
Multiple citizenship
Multiple citizenship is a status in which a person is concurrently regarded as a citizen under the laws of more than one state. Multiple citizenships exist because different countries use different, and not necessarily mutually exclusive, citizenship requirements...

. It is possible for a United States citizen to have dual citizenship, for example by birth in the United States to a parent who is a citizen of a foreign country. Anyone who becomes a naturalized U.S. citizen is required to renounce any prior citizenship during the naturalization ceremony; however, this renunciation may not necessarily be considered effective by the country of prior citizenship. United States citizens are required by federal law to identify themselves with a U.S. passport, not with any foreign passport, when entering the US. The Supreme Court case of Afroyim v. Rusk
Afroyim v. Rusk
Afroyim v. Rusk, 387 U.S. 253 , was a United States Supreme Court decision that set an important legal precedent that a person born or naturalized in the United States cannot be deprived of his or her citizenship involuntarily. The U.S. government had attempted to revoke the citizenship of a man...

declared that a U.S. citizen did not lose his citizenship by voting in an election in a foreign country, or by acquiring foreign citizenship, if such acts did not require him to explicitly renounce his U.S. citizenship.

The concept of dual citizenship (while not unique to the U.S.) has been the subject of controversy in the U.S. Michael Barone

Michael Barone (pundit)

Michael Barone is a conservative American political analyst, pundit and journalist. He is best known for being the principal author of The Almanac of American Politics, a reference work concerning US governors and federal politicians, and published biennially by National Journal...

in US News argued that "dual citizenship is a threat to the American tradition of patriotic assimilation" as well as possibly undermining American sovereignty, while others have argued that the effects are less pernicious. Americans who have dual citizenship do not lose their United States citizenship unless they renounce it officially. When Mexico allowed people to become dual citizens, many Mexican-born American residents sought dual citizenship; in this case, dual citizenship with Mexico and the US. This dual status offers benefits such as the ability to own property anywhere in Mexico, and legal status to live and work in either country; but one drawback is that dual citizens cannot hold political office in Mexico. Before 1998, many Mexicans were reluctant to become United States citizens, fearing they would lose real estate, inheritances or businesses in Mexico. In 2003 in the United States, there were 32.8 million Hispanics; of these, 21.7 million were from Mexico or had Mexican heritage; of these, 7.8 million had been born in Mexico; and of these, 1.6 million had become American citizens; of these, 30,000 had become dual citizens from 2000 to 2003.

History of citizenship in the United States

Citizenship began in colonial times as an active relation between people working cooperatively to solve municipal problems and participating actively in democratic decision-making, such as in New England

New England

New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...

town hall meetings. People met regularly to discuss local affairs and make decisions. These town meetings were described as the "earliest form of American democracy" which was vital since citizen participation in public affairs helped keep democracy

Democracy

"sturdy", according to Alexis de Tocqueville

Alexis de Tocqueville

Alexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville was a French political thinker and historian best known for his Democracy in America and The Old Regime and the Revolution . In both of these works, he explored the effects of the rising equality of social conditions on the individual and the state in...

in 1835. A variety of forces changed this relation during the nation's history, including specialization of people into more focused roles which didn't include civic participation, government centralization, technological change, media exposure, prosperity, increased mobility making civic participation more difficult, and so forth. Attendance at town meetings dwindled. Voting declined. Citizenship became less defined by participation in politics and more defined as a legal relation with accompanying rights

Rights

and privileges. While the realm of civic participation in the public sphere

Public sphere

The public sphere is an area in social life where individuals can come together to freely discuss and identify societal problems, and through that discussion influence political action...

has shrunk, the citizenship franchise has been expanded to include not just propertied white adult men but African-American men and adult women. Thinkers such as Robert Kaplan

Robert D. Kaplan

Robert David Kaplan is an American journalist, currently a National Correspondent for the Atlantic Monthly...

, Naomi Wolf

Naomi Wolf

Naomi Wolf is an American author and political consultant. With the publication of The Beauty Myth, she became a leading spokesperson of what was later described as the third wave of the feminist movement.-Biography:...

, Dana D. Nelson

Dana D. Nelson

and others have suggested that the decline of citizenship

Citizenship

may pose problems for democracy in the future. Nevertheless, a continuing benefit of citizenship offers a chance to participate in a dynamic economic marketplace

Economy of the United States

The economy of the United States is the world's largest national economy. Its nominal GDP was estimated to be nearly $14.5 trillion in 2010, approximately a quarter of nominal global GDP. The European Union has a larger collective economy, but is not a single nation...

Birthright citizenship

U.S. citizenship is usually acquired by birth when a child is born in the territory of the United States. In addition to the U.S. States, this includes the District of Columbia, Guam

Guam

Guam is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States located in the western Pacific Ocean. It is one of five U.S. territories with an established civilian government. Guam is listed as one of 16 Non-Self-Governing Territories by the Special Committee on Decolonization of the United...

, Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...

, the Northern Mariana Islands

Northern Mariana Islands

The Northern Mariana Islands, officially the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands , is a commonwealth in political union with the United States, occupying a strategic region of the western Pacific Ocean. It consists of 15 islands about three-quarters of the way from Hawaii to the Philippines...

and the U.S. Virgin Islands. This is provided under the 14th Amendment

Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

. Citizenship, however, was not specified in the original Constitution

United States Constitution

. It was not until 1868 that the Fourteenth Amendment

Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

defined citizens as persons who were either born or naturalized

Naturalization

Naturalization is the acquisition of citizenship and nationality by somebody who was not a citizen of that country at the time of birth....

in the United States and subject to its jurisdiction. All babies born in the United States–except those born to enemy aliens in wartime or the children of foreign diplomats–enjoy American citizenship under the Supreme Court's

Supreme Court of the United States

The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...

long-standing interpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment. It says: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside." Still, the amendment did not specify exactly what the relation of "citizenship" meant.

Some, but not all, children born outside the United States with at least one U.S. citizen parent have birthright citizenship by parentage.

While persons born in the United States are considered to be citizens and can have passports, children under age eighteen are legally considered to be minors

Minor (law)

In law, a minor is a person under a certain age — the age of majority — which legally demarcates childhood from adulthood; the age depends upon jurisdiction and application, but is typically 18...

and cannot vote or hold office. Upon the event of their eighteenth birthday, they are considered full citizens but there is no ceremony acknowledging this relation or any correspondence between the new citizen and the government to this effect. Citizenship is assumed to exist, and the relation is assumed to remain viable until death or until it is renounced or dissolved by some other legal process. While citizenship poses few requirements or duties, secondary schools teach the basics of citizenship and create "informed and responsible citizens" who are "skilled in the arts of effective deliberation and action." Teachers try to encourage students to believe that "their ballots count."

However, there have been a few exceptions in which people born in the United States were not officially considered to be citizens. For example, in 1985, a renegade band of 143 Kickapoo Indians were naturalized; they had been living under an expressway bridge to Piedras Negras

Piedras Negras, Coahuila

-Natural Resources:This region generates a large amount of the national production of coal, one of the most economically important non-metallic minerals in the state.-Tourism:Piedras Negras' main tourist attractions are:...

in Mexico.

One controversial practice is maternity citizenship. It refers to the fact that babies born to foreign women while visiting the United States are automatically considered to have birthright citizenship

Birthright citizenship in the United States of America

Birthright citizenship in the United States refers to a person's acquisition of United States citizenship by virtue of the circumstances of his or her birth. It contrasts with citizenship acquired in other ways, for example by naturalization later in life. Birthright citizenship may be conferred by...

. It has been criticized as encouraging women to enter the country illegally to give birth to U.S. citizens; by one estimate, there were 400,000 so-called anchor babies born in 2008 of whom neither parent was a United States citizen. The policy has been criticized further as an "antiquated practice" in which the baby becomes an "anchor" preventing deportation of "unlawfully present parents" and becomes an impediment to stabilizing the U.S. population. However, proposals to further the Birthright Citizenship Act of 2009 (H.R. 1868) have been criticized as being "beside the point" and that the real reason for illegal immigration is based on the need for employment. 2008 presidential candidate Mitt Romney

Mitt Romney

Willard Mitt Romney is an American businessman and politician. He was the 70th Governor of Massachusetts from 2003 to 2007 and is a candidate for the 2012 Republican Party presidential nomination.The son of George W...

argued that birthright citizenship can lead to chain migration in which a child born in the US to illegal immigrants permits an entire family to become eligible for American citizenship as a result. What is notable regarding this is that people seeking entry into the United States by virtue of a family member's citizenship still require a sponsor, and an anchor baby

Anchor baby

"Anchor baby" is a pejorative term for a child born in the United States to immigrant parents, who, as an American citizen, supposedly can later facilitate immigration for relatives...

does not meet the financial qualifications to be a sponsor. Constitutional scholars have debated whether it's possible to end birthright citizenship through legislation or whether it requires a constitutional amendment.

But the opposite situation, in which an American couple adopted a foreign-born child, used to mean huge headaches after the adoption process in terms of getting the foreign-born child recognized as a citizen. However, the Child Citizenship Act of 2000

Child Citizenship Act of 2000

The Child Citizenship Act of 2000 is a United States federal law that allows certain foreign-born, biological and adopted children of United States citizens to acquire United States citizenship automatically. These children did not acquire U.S. citizenship at birth, but they are granted citizenship...

, which took effect in February 2001, made it easier for parents adopting children in foreign countries to naturalize them. Up until the law, "parents of youngsters adopted overseas were required to undergo a costly and cumbersome naturalization process that sometimes took two years to complete" in addition to usually complex international adoption procedures; the new law meant that 75,000 adopted foreign-born children automatically became citizens. One estimate was that, in 2001, there were about 20,000 such adoptions every year, and the average wait for citizenship processing by the Immigration and Naturalization Service had been two years. But with the new law, that process will be shortened considerably.

Americans who live in foreign countries and become members of other governments have, in some instances, been stripped of citizenship, although there have been court cases where decisions regarding citizenship have been reversed.

Agency in charge

The agency in charge of admitting new citizens is the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services

United States Citizenship and Immigration Services

United States Citizenship and Immigration Services is a component of the United States Department of Homeland Security . It performs many administrative functions formerly carried out by the legacy United States Immigration and Naturalization Service , which was part of the Department of Justice...

, commonly abbreviated as USCIS. It is a bureau of the Department of Homeland Security

United States Department of Homeland Security

The United States Department of Homeland Security is a cabinet department of the United States federal government, created in response to the September 11 attacks, and with the primary responsibilities of protecting the territory of the United States and protectorates from and responding to...

. It offers web-based services. The agency depends on application fees for revenue; in 2009, with a struggling economy, applications were down sharply, and consequently there was much less revenue to upgrade and streamline services. There was speculation that if the administration of president Barack Obama

Barack Obama

Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...

passes immigration reform, then the agency could face a "welcome but overwhelming surge of Americans-in-waiting" and longer processing times for citizenship applications. The USCIS has made efforts to digitize records. A USCIS website says the "U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is committed to offering the best possible service to you, our customer" and which says "With our focus on customer service, we offer you a variety of services both before and after you file your case." The website allowed applicants to estimate the length of time required to process specific types of cases, to check application status, and to access a customer guide. The USCIS processes cases in the order they're received.

Pathways to citizenship

Requirements. People applying to become citizens must satisfy certain requirements. For example, there have been requirements for applicants to have lived in the nation for five years (three if married to a U.S. citizen,) be of "good moral character" meaning no felony convictions, be of "sound mind" in the judgment of immigration officials, have knowledge of the Constitution
United States Constitution
The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It is the framework for the organization of the United States government and for the relationship of the federal government with the states, citizens, and all people within the United States.The first three...

, and be able to speak and understand English unless they're elderly or disabled.

Military participation is often a way for immigrant residents to become citizens. Since many people seek citizenship for its financial and social benefits, the promise of citizenship can be seen as a means of motivating persons to do dangerous activities such as fight in wars. For example, one account suggested the United States Military was recruiting "skilled immigrants who are living in this country with temporary visas" by promising an opportunity to become citizens "in as little as six months" in exchange for service in Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...

and Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....

where US forces are "stretched thin." The option was not open to illegal immigrants. One estimate was that in 2009 the US military had 29,000 foreign-born people currently serving who were not American citizens. Generally, spouses of citizens, and non-citizens who served in the military, have less difficulty becoming citizens. Generally there is a strong link between military service and citizenship. One analyst noted that "many immigrants, not yet citizens, have volunteered to serve in the United States military forces ... Some have been killed and others wounded ... Perhaps this can be seen as a cynical attempt to qualify more easily for U.S. citizenship ... But I think that service in the U.S. military has to be taken as a pretty serious commitment to the United States." Immigrant soldiers who fight for the US often have an easier and faster path to citizenship. In 2002, President Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....

signed an executive order to eliminate the three-year waiting period and made service personnel immediately eligible for citizenship. In 2003, Congress voted to "cut the waiting period to become a citizen from three years down to one year" for immigrants who had served in the armed forces. In 2003, of 1.4 million service members, 37,000 active-duty members were not citizens, and of these, 20 percent had applied for citizenship. By June 2003, 12 non-citizens had died fighting for the United States in the Iraqi war. The military has had a tradition of "filling out its ranks" with aliens living in the U.S. Non-citizens fought in World War II. The military has struggled to "fill its depleted ranks" by recruiting more non-US citizens. But there is considerable anxiety about using foreigners to serve in the U.S. armed forces. General Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army...

was quoted as saying: "When Rome went out and hired mercenary soldiers, Rome fell."

Grandparent rule. One obscure ruling of section 322 of a 1994 immigration law enabled persons to emigrate to the United States if they could prove that a grandparent was a citizen. In 2006, there were 4,000 applications of citizenship through grandparents. While parents of any nationality can use the law, Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

is comprise 90% of those taking advantage of the clause.

Amnesties have happened in the past in which illegal residents could petition for citizenship if they could prove that they had been living in the nation for a specified number of years.

Citizenship test. Last, applicants must pass a simple citizenship test. Up until recently, a test published by the Immigration and Naturalization Service
Immigration and Naturalization Service
The United States Immigration and Naturalization Service , now referred to as Legacy INS, ceased to exist under that name on March 1, 2003, when most of its functions were transferred from the Department of Justice to three new components within the newly created Department of Homeland Security, as...

asked questions such as "How many stars are there in our flag?" and "What is the Constitution?" and "Who is the president of the United States today?" At one point, the Government Printing Office sold flashcards for $8.50 to help test takers prepare for the test. In 2006, the government replaced the former trivia test with a ten-question oral test designed to "shun simple historical facts about America that can be recounted in a few words for more explanation about the principles of American democracy, such as freedom." One reviewer described the new citizenship test as "thoughtful." While some have criticized the new version of the test, officials counter that the new test is a "teachable moment" without making it conceptually more difficult, since the list of possible questions and answers, as before, will be publicly available. Six correct answers constitutes a passing grade. The new test probes for signs that immigrants "understand and share American values."

Strong demand

According to a senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute

Migration Policy Institute

The Migration Policy Institute is a Washington, D.C.-based think tank established in 2001 by Kathleen Newland and Demetrios G. Papademetriou. It is "an independent, non-partisan, non-profit think-tank dedicated to the study of the movement of people worldwide." The Migration policy Institute works...

, "Citizenship is a very, very valuable commodity." However, one study suggested legal residents eligible for citizenship, but who don't apply, tend to have low incomes (41 percent), do not speak English well (60 percent), or have low levels of education (25 percent). There is strong demand for citizenship based on the numbers of applications filed. From 1920 to 1940, the number of immigrants to the United States who became citizens numbered about 200,000 each year; there was a spike after World War II, and then the level reduced to about 150,000 per year until resuming to the 200,000 level beginning about 1980. In the mid-1990s to 2009, the levels rose to about 500,000 per year with considerable variation. In 1996, more than one million people became citizens through naturalization. In 1997, there were 1.41 million applications filed; in 2006, 1.38 million. In the mid-1990s, the number of naturalized citizens in the United States rose from 6.5 million to 11 million in 2002. By 2003, the pool of immigrants eligible to become naturalized citizens was 8 million, and of these, 2.7 million lived in California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

. In 2003, the number of new citizens from naturalization was 463,204. In 2007, the number was 702,589. In 2007, 1.38 million people applied for citizenship creating a backlog. In 2008, applications decreased to 525,786.

Naturalization fees were $60 in 1989; $90 in 1991; $95 in 1994; $225 in 1999; $260 in 2002; $320 in 2003; $330 in 2005. Application fees were increased from $330 to $595 and an additional $80 computerized fingerprinting fee was added. The high fees have been criticized as putting up one more wall to citizenship. Increases in fees for citizenship have drawn criticism. Doris Meissner, a senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute

Migration Policy Institute

and former Immigration and Naturalization Service Commissioner, doubted that fee increases deter citizenship-seekers. In 2009, the number of immigrants applying for citizenship plunged 62 percent; reasons cited were the slowing economy and the cost of naturalization.

Citizenship ceremonies

The citizenship process has been described as a ritual that is meaningful for many immigrants. Many new citizens are sworn in during Fourth of July

Independence Day (United States)

Independence Day, commonly known as the Fourth of July, is a federal holiday in the United States commemorating the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, declaring independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain...

ceremonies. Most citizenship ceremonies take place at offices of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. However, one swearing-in ceremony was held at Arlington National Cemetery

Arlington National Cemetery

Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington County, Virginia, is a military cemetery in the United States of America, established during the American Civil War on the grounds of Arlington House, formerly the estate of the family of Confederate general Robert E. Lee's wife Mary Anna Lee, a great...

in Virginia

Virginia

The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...

in 2008. The judge who chose this venue explained: "I did it to honor our country's warriors and to give the new citizens a sense for what makes this country great." According to federal law, citizenship applicants who are also changing their names must appear before a federal judge.

Honorary citizenship

The title of "Honorary Citizen of the United States

Honorary Citizen of the United States

A person of exceptional merit, generally a non-United States citizen, may be declared an Honorary Citizen of the United States by an Act of Congress, or by a proclamation issued by the President of the United States, pursuant to authorization granted by Congress.Seven people have been so honored,...

" has been granted seven times by an act of Congress

Act of Congress

An Act of Congress is a statute enacted by government with a legislature named "Congress," such as the United States Congress or the Congress of the Philippines....

or by a proclamation issued by the President

President of the United States

The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....

pursuant to authorization granted by Congress. The seven individuals are Sir Winston Churchill

Winston Churchill

Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...

, Raoul Wallenberg

Raoul Wallenberg

Raoul Wallenberg was a Swedish businessman, diplomat and humanitarian. He is widely celebrated for his successful efforts to rescue thousands of Jews in Nazi-occupied Hungary from the Holocaust, during the later stages of World War II...

, William Penn

William Penn

William Penn was an English real estate entrepreneur, philosopher, and founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, the English North American colony and the future Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. He was an early champion of democracy and religious freedom, notable for his good relations and successful...

, Hannah Callowhill Penn

Hannah Callowhill Penn

As reported by Lauren Lizerbram, Hannah Callowhill Penn, was the second wife of Pennsylvania founder William Penn; she effectively administered the Province of Pennsylvania for six years after her husband suffered a series of strokes and then for another eight years after her husband's death...

, Mother Teresa

Mother Teresa

Mother Teresa , born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu , was a Roman Catholic nun of Albanian ethnicity and Indian citizenship, who founded the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta, India, in 1950...

, the Marquis de Lafayette, and Casimir Pulaski.

Sometimes, the government awarded non-citizen immigrants who died fighting for American forces with the posthumous title of U.S. citizenship, but this is not considered honorary citizenship. In June 2003, Congress approved legislation to help families of fallen non-citizen soldiers.

Corporate citizenship

There is a sense in which corporations can be considered as "citizens." Since corporations are often thought of as individuals in the eyes of the law

Legal personality

Legal personality is the characteristic of a non-human entity regarded by law to have the status of a person....

, then it is possible to think of corporations as being like citizens. For example, the airline Virgin America

Virgin America

Virgin America, Inc. is a United States-based low-cost airline that began service on August 8, 2007. The airline's stated aim is to provide low-fare, high-quality service for "long-haul point-to-point service between major metropolitan cities on the Eastern and West Coast seaboards." San Francisco...

asked the United States Department of Transportation

United States Department of Transportation

The United States Department of Transportation is a federal Cabinet department of the United States government concerned with transportation. It was established by an act of Congress on October 15, 1966, and began operation on April 1, 1967...

to be treated as an American air carrier. The advantage of "citizenship" is having the protection and support of the United States government when jockeying with foreign governments for access to air routes and overseas airports. A competitor of Virgin America called Alaska Airlines

Alaska Airlines

Alaska Airlines is an airline based in the Seattle suburb of SeaTac, Washington in the United States. The airline originated in 1932 as McGee Airways. After many mergers with and acquisitions of other airlines, including Star Air Service, it became known as Alaska Airlines in 1944...

asked for a review of the situation; according to "U.S. law, foreign ownership in a U.S. air carrier is limited to 25% of the voting interest in the carrier", but executives at Virgin America insisted the airline met this requirement.

For the purposes of diversity jurisdiction

Diversity jurisdiction

In the law of the United States, diversity jurisdiction is a form of subject-matter jurisdiction in civil procedure in which a United States district court has the power to hear a civil case where the persons that are parties are "diverse" in citizenship, which generally indicates that they are...

in United States civil procedure

Civil procedure

Civil procedure is the body of law that sets out the rules and standards that courts follow when adjudicating civil lawsuits...

, corporate citizenship is determined by the principal place of business of the corporation. There is some degree of disagreement among legal authorities as to how exactly this may be determined.

Another sense of "corporate citizenship" is a way to show support for causes such as social issues and the environment

Corporate social responsibility

Corporate social responsibility is a form of corporate self-regulation integrated into a business model...

and, indirectly, gain a kind of "reputational advantage."

Controversies

The issue of citizenship naturalization is a highly contentious matter in American politics, particularly regarding illegal immigrants. Candidates in the 2008 presidential election such as Rudolph Giuliani tried to "carve out a middle ground" on the issue of illegal immigration, but rivals such as John McCain

John McCain

John Sidney McCain III is the senior United States Senator from Arizona. He was the Republican nominee for president in the 2008 United States election....

advocated legislation requiring illegal immigrants to first leave the country before being eligible to apply as citizens. Some measures to require proof of citizenship at polling places have met with controversy. In the past, some rulings have prevented homosexuals from entering the nation and applying for citizenship.

Issues such as whether to include questions about current citizenship status in census

United States Census

The United States Census is a decennial census mandated by the United States Constitution. The population is enumerated every 10 years and the results are used to allocate Congressional seats , electoral votes, and government program funding. The United States Census Bureau The United States Census...

questions have been debated in the Senate

United States Senate

The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...

. Generally, there tends to be controversy when citizenship impacts political issues. For example, issues such as asking questions about citizenship on the United States Census

United States Census

tend to cause controversy. Census data affects state electoral clout; it also affects budgetary allocations.

There have been controversies based on speculation about which way newly naturalized citizens are likely to vote. Since immigrants from many countries have been presumed to vote Democratic

Democratic Party (United States)

The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...

if naturalized, there have been efforts by Democratic administrations to streamline citizenship applications before elections to increase turnout; Republicans

Republican Party (United States)

The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...

, in contrast, have exerted pressure to slow down the process. In 1997, there were efforts to strip the citizenship of 5,000 newly approved immigrants who, it was thought, had been "wrongly naturalized"; a legal effort to do this presented enormous challenges. An examination by the Immigration and Naturalization Service

Immigration and Naturalization Service

The United States Immigration and Naturalization Service , now referred to as Legacy INS, ceased to exist under that name on March 1, 2003, when most of its functions were transferred from the Department of Justice to three new components within the newly created Department of Homeland Security, as...

of 1.1 million people who were granted citizenship from September 1995 to September 1996 found 4,946 cases in which a criminal arrest should have disqualified an applicant or in which an applicant lied about his or her criminal history. Before the 2008 election, there was controversy about the speed of the USCIS in processing applications; one report suggested that the agency would complete 930,000 applications in time for the newly processed citizens to vote in the November 2008 election. Foreign-born naturalized citizens tend to vote at the same rates as natives. For example, in the state of New Jersey

New Jersey

New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...

in the 2008 election, the foreign born represented 20.1 percent of the state's population of 8,754,560; of these, 636,000 were eighteen or older and hence eligible to vote; of eligible voters, 396,000 actually voted, which was about 62%. So foreign-born citizens vote in roughly the same proportion (62%) as native citizens (67%).

There has been controversy about the agency in charge of citizenship. The USCIS has been criticized as being a "notoriously surly, inattentive bureaucracy" with long backlogs in which "would-be citizens spent years waiting for paperwork." Rules made by United States Congress

United States Congress

and the federal government

Federal government of the United States

The federal government of the United States is the national government of the constitutional republic of fifty states that is the United States of America. The federal government comprises three distinct branches of government: a legislative, an executive and a judiciary. These branches and...

regarding citizenship are highly technical and often confusing, and the agency is forced to cope with enforcement within a complex regulatory milieu. There have been instances in which applicants for citizenship have been deported on technicalities. One Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...

doctor and his wife, both from the Philippines

Philippines

The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

who applied for citizenship, and one Mr. Darnell from Canada who was married to an American with two children from this marriage, ran afoul of legal technicalities and faced deportation. The New York Times reported that "Mr. Darnell discovered that a 10-year-old conviction for domestic violence involving a former girlfriend, even though it had been reduced to a misdemeanor and erased from his public record, made him ineligible to become a citizen–or even to continue living in the United States." Overworked federal examiners under pressure to make "quick decisions" as well as "weed out security risks" have been described as preferring "to err on the side of rejection." In 2000, 399,670 applications were denied (about 1/3 of all applications); in 2007, 89,683 applications for naturalization were denied, about 12 percent of those presented.

Generally, eligibility for citizenship is denied for the millions of people living in the United States illegally, although from time to time, there have been amnesties. In 2006, there were mass protests numbering hundreds of thousands of people throughout the US demanding U.S. citizenship for illegal immigrants. Many carried banners which read "We Have A Dream Too." One estimate is that there are 12 million illegal immigrants in the USA in 2006. There are many American high school students with citizenship issues. One estimate is that there are 65,000 illegal immigrant students in 2008. A 1982 Supreme Court

Supreme Court of the United States

decision entitled illegal immigrants to free education from kindergarten

Kindergarten

A kindergarten is a preschool educational institution for children. The term was created by Friedrich Fröbel for the play and activity institute that he created in 1837 in Bad Blankenburg as a social experience for children for their transition from home to school...

through high school

High school

High school is a term used in parts of the English speaking world to describe institutions which provide all or part of secondary education. The term is often incorporated into the name of such institutions....

. But it is less clear about post-secondary education.

Illegal aliens who get caught in the gears of the justice system face horrendous odds; for example, if their lawyer makes a mistake during a hearing, they have no constitutional right to challenge the outcome of their deportation hearings. Writer Tom Barry of the Boston Review
Boston Review
Boston Review is a bimonthly American political and literary magazine. The magazine covers, specifically, political debates, literature, and poetry...

criticizes the crackdown against illegal immigrants since it has "flooded the federal courts with nonviolent offenders, besieged poor communities, and dramatically increased the U.S. prison population, while doing little to solve the problem itself." Barry criticizes the United States' high incarceration rate

United States incarceration rate

The United States of America has an incarceration rate of 743 per 100,000 of national population , the highest in the world. In comparison, Russia has the second highest 577 per 100,000, Canada is 123rd in the world with 117 per 100,000, and China has 120 per 100,000...

as being "fives times greater than the average rate in the rest of the world." Virginia

Virginia

Senator Jim Webb

Jim Webb

James Henry "Jim" Webb, Jr. is the senior United States Senator from Virginia. He is also an author and a former Secretary of the Navy. He is a member of the Democratic Party....

agreed that we are "doing something dramatically wrong in our criminal justice system."

External links

How to Become a US citizen - an article on the process of becoming a US citizen
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services - Citizenship Resource Center
Study materials for the U.S. citizenship civics test

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Relation of citizenship

Duties

Rights

Substantial benefits

Civic participation

Dual citizenship

History of citizenship in the United States

Birthright citizenship

Agency in charge

Pathways to citizenship

Strong demand

Citizenship ceremonies

Honorary citizenship

Corporate citizenship

Controversies

See also

External links